A Skull Full of Souls

“You know, thish water shtain really ish a work of art! The more I look at it, the more cshertain I am that it’sh a perfect map of the northern trade route. We musht check theshe two marksh here, where the mold hash grown into the vague shape of a treashure chesht!”

Borbigmos groans and wishes his cell had a pillow that he could hold onto. “Shut yer gob! Ye unnatural bundle of wyvern pellets.” He looks dubiously at his filthy hands. Wondering again whether it is worth trying to plug his ears. Then he remembers that he isn’t hearing this particular nuisance with his ears. “Akh der'mo! Why’dya have to open yer bony jaw? Why did I try to help ya?” He pokes the hunched form fiddling with the lock and pulls his finger back when the figure snarls and swats at his hands. “An ye! Why in all the worlds did ye decide that moment was a perfect time to leap outtae the cart and bite a city guard, ye vicious badger?”

“No poking.” Sasha snarls before returning her attention to the lock. “Am otter.”

“What?”

Am otter, not badger!”

“You know, I’m shure you’re ash excshited ash me about a shecret map of the north roadsh and their treashure. But shincshe all of my bonesh are shtuck in thish bag in a shtorage room, I can’t actually hear you reshponding. I’m jusht going to imagine your gratitude ash I entertain you during our brief shtay in thish wonderful prishon.”

A single manly tear falls from the bloodshot eye of Borbigmos. “Tha’s it. First chance I get, I’m learning the silence spell.” He contemplates his finger, covered in the damp black earth and hay flecks that had sullied his hands when he’d broken his fall into the cell. He knew Candii had the restoration spell. So he decided it was worth the risk of ear sickness, and his thick digits plunged into his ears.

“Sho, onecshe again we have time for my shtory. I can shee it now. Your overly thick gray eyebrow twitching with impatiencshe. Wanting me to get on with my mosht fashinating shtory.”

Borbigmos releases a muffled giggle-sob as he remembers once again that telepathy isn’t blocked by covering your ears. He’s just defiled his ears for nothing. “I get it now, why they all tried to stop me from asking about his past.” He rocks back and forth. Vowing to boot that damn skull out of the city.

“Well, ash you can imagine. The following few yearsh were a blur of hard work. Wait! You’re a bardic type. Imagine it ash a bunch of schenesh shet to mushic! Let’sh make the shong be…Nothing ish Deadlier Than A Wizshard’sh Apprenticshe! Have me learning to do shtuff and falling, and laughing. Then cut to Andy grumpily shaking hish head and moving away. Then, show me being taught magic by Andy, me shpeaking a queshtion and him shooting me with lightning. Switch to me and Vinny shneaking up on Andy while he’sh working with the trapsh and have it crush a bunch of hish undead shervants when we shcare him. Show him shcreaming at ush ash I bump fishts with a vine holding a dwarven hand. Then show ush being shet on fire by him ash we flail about schreaming and shee my body explode apart ash I loshe control of my Aetherflesh and launch bitsh of myshelf everywhere. Finally have the mushic begin to fade ash the shcene cutsh to a very charred Vinny and I shtanding in front of a grumpy Andy.”

Borbigmos had to admit. That would probably be a pretty great production. He really wanted to keep his anger going, but damn him if he also didn’t want to hear the rest of the tale. He started tapping his fingers to the song and tried to imagine the story.

***

Andendor glared at the still smoking, charred duo of troublemakers. He spared a particularly dour few seconds on the skeleton. Andendor’s Folly indeed. He thought. I still can’t decide if that thing is a monument to my failures or successes.

“I’ve had enough of you two. You,” He pointed at Julius. “Prepare Patches for me. Affix him with the large saddle and attach my mobile laboratory. Then head to the catacombs and summon four Aviar, two zombified, two skeletal, And four sets of haunted armor.” Andendor glared at the two. “I know you’re young and have trouble maintaining unity. I know you were just playing and that I did grant you autonomy. But you’ve gone too far.” He straightened, abandoned his scholarly hunch, and his voice boomed with the magic he channeled. “I deem your actions as becoming dangerously close to violating your contract.” Julius gasped. “INDEED.” Though Andendor had not raised his voice, Julius could feel it rumble against their souls. “I judge that corrective actions must be completed henceforth, or I shall find our agreement in breach.” Andendor gestured out the door and spoke again. “Go to your task, complete it and return. By then, I will have a project for you that must be completed before I return.”

Julius bowed. The contract was squeezing against his souls. He couldn’t have spoken if he’d wanted to. His footsteps clacked as he walked in stiff silence.

The dark vine of Vinny. Emitted a hum of discontent. “Was that really necessary?”

Andendor scowled and turned to Vinny. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten you, old friend.” He harrumphed and paced around his study. “Look, I understand that you’re trying to nurture it. That it’s fresh and impulsive, so full of ideas of pranks that seem fun and of little consequence. But, well, they are of consequence. Those servants that were crushed. They may have been mindless and one of many in my horde. But…Gods man!” He threw his hands up. “I know I’m not exactly a good person, and that I made those servants from my victims. But that’s the point. They were people! I respect their choice to try attacking me. I am, in many ways, a blight and a poison to these lands. I love that those people will eventually stop me if I go too far. And I want them to. I became what I am not out of malice or greed. I chose it as the only path to breaking the chains that bind this whole world. I respect them, and think of our fight as a contract. One where they agree to loan me their strength if they cannot kill me. But only temporarily. One day, when they’ve fulfilled my tasks, I shall release them from their undeath. Even worse, if I run out of the volunteers who seek to plunder my lands, I shall be forced to hunt the innocent. To send raids to farms and villages. What a terrible thing to do, when all I want, is to improve this world.”

Vinny rumbled in contemplation. “Then why only punish Julius?”

Andendor sighed and stared not at the vine but at Vinny’s heart root a few rooms away. “Firstly, I am going to punish you. But my treatment of you differs due to status. We are equals and peers. We set the terms of our relationship long ago and pranks are not, in any way, against the rules.” Andendor points to the stable. “Julius is a slave. A slave I treat well in the hopes that one day, they will stand beside me as an equal partner, and a walking, talking, proof of concept of the project he was born through.” Andendor took out a chest and sat it on his desk. He grabbed a few other containers and filled them with items he wanted to take with him. “In that chest is all the information, tools, and other errata that Julius will need to complete their punishment project. I expect it to be finished before I return in six months. Your punishment, should you accept that you were in the wrong. Or maybe just because you think of yourself as my friend and are willing to pitch in when I’m upset, is one of automation. You’ve seen me work every trap, you’ve observed much of every project. I want you to keep all of that running. I will put you in charge of all the dead. They will follow your every command. Keep my projects running. Take proper notes. And farm those invaders for every resource you can. Please limit their suffering. Cruelty is inefficient and causes crusades.”

Vinny thought for a moment and bobbed in agreement. “I will do so. Where are you going?”

“I’ve found a lead. The continued existence of Voracity inside Julius is both an opportunity and detriment to my plans. I intend to seek out the outcast eaters in the gloom warrens. Rumor is that the writer of some of the letters I used to create Julius is there, and the letters themselves display a rather incredible willingness to engage in cooperative research with the food races.” He frowned, his leathery skin pulled taut. “Honestly, I feel like I’m missing something. We’ve been pushing Julius to grow every way I can think of for years. And yet, If he’s even a category one on the power scale, I’ll dance a jig in front of the next group of adventurers as they try to hit me with arrows.”

Vinny rumbled with thoughtfulness. “That is odd.”

“Indeed.” Andendor threw his best grimoire into his bag a little harder than he meant to. Gasped in horror at his own mistreatment of his tool and carefully smoothed the pale leather cover. Checking for damage. “It must be something obvious. A skilled and lucky group of adventurers can reach the limit of their power in several years, assuming they survive their mad lifestyle. And none grow faster than when they first start. Many adventurers increase from category 0 to 2 within a week of their first adventure.” Andendor starts loading his fine clothes and few remaining necessities before surveying the room for anything he’s forgotten. “Julius has slain multiple category 5 monsters, he’s slain hundreds of weaker ones. I’ve given them training, quests, elixirs of strength, and any other damn power source I could think of and more from you. Yet it still has the potentia of a child.” Andendor kicked his chest closed and gathered his things. “That’s it. I’m about to leave. Please deliver Julius the research and give it instructions. I hope to return in six months.” He focuses for a second and waves his fingers. All the lights flick off, candles snuff, and gems dim. “Goodbye Vinny.”

“Safe travels Andy.”

***

The skeleton was grinning as they held a gem to their head. There was a bright flash from the gem, mirrored in the multi-toned glowing orbs of the skeleton’s eyes. The skeleton convulsed as blue and violet energy constructs in the shape of muscles and tendons appeared. They flexed and quivered before all tension left his body and the skeleton slid bonelessl–well, not bonelessly, obviously. More like bonily to the floor. A dark vine hovered over the skeleton. A shadow-stained Dwarven skull held in the vine’s tendrils. “Are you well, little one?”

“Uggh, Woah.” Slowly, Julius turned and looked at Vinny. “I know Kung Fu.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Vinny spoke. “Umm, what?”

Julius blinked–that is, his multitone eyes smushed from glowing orbs to glowing multitone lines before they popped back to their original shape. “Shorry I’ve no idea what that meansh. It’sh what Boffah would have shaid.”

“Boffah?”

“Yeah, the monk whoshe memoriesh I jusht read.”

“His name was Boffah?”

“Indeed, the renowned pugilisht monk Boffah Diezh Nuetzh. He wash on a quesht to sheek the holy grail that would save hish monashtery from the deadly plague of Ligma.” Julius stopped and blinked again. “ And for shome reashon, I shuddenly free ashamed to have shaid that. I alsho feel like shnickering and rolling my eyesh.”

“Why?”

“I’ve absholutely no idea! It’sh jusht a feeling from the gem. But…that wash a really weird mind. It wash too clean. Too empty.” Julius threw up his hands and moved to a dirt circle in the corner of his lab. A zombie stands in the center, staring vacantly at a nearby wall. “Let’sh begin, ‘imported maritial shkill trial one,’”

In the corner of the room a vine with glasses wrapped around it clutched a notepad and another held a quill and ink. They scribbled down all the words that the two spoke. The zombie was a red haired human wearing a terribly-stained but fashionable vest. A silk handkerchief with ‘Diez Nuetz’ monogrammed on it stuck out of its chest pocket. It didn’t react as Julius approached. “Trial one: Imported shkill retention and immediate viability.” Julius intoned before he sprinted at the zombie, who stared vacantly at a point just over his shoulder bones. Julius shrieked high-pitch noises with each strike. Something his new instincts declared with absolute certainty had to be done for the fighting-style to work. He struck with a four strike combination. The first was a stunning palm strike that his instincts said could easily be turned into a feint or parry. The second was an elbow strike designed to close the melee distance and wind your foe. The third, a low disabling strike at the knee joint, designed to break the opponent's stance completely and possibly a knee as well. All the previous strikes were designed so that the opponent was completely unprepared for the finishing blow. A grappling toss that slammed the foe into the ground with bone-breaking force. “Hie-Yaah! Huya! Hooyup? EYY-AUUUGSHIIIIT!”

The first palm struck perfectly, His muscles along his arm and wrist glowed a deep blue, then shattered. Sending his hand spinning away, almost as if waving goodbye. Deeply focused on the alien knowledge that Julius hadn’t known even this morning. He continued the strikes. His now handless arm jabbed its elbow into the sternum of the Deceased Boffah. His shoulder muscles shattered as well, sending the rest of the arm waving after its lost digits. Still focused on the next strike in the sequence, Julius barely registered that the strike had hurt more than expected and that something felt off. Still, he continued. Then after, his shin connected with the side of Zombie-Boffah’s knee. Julius saw his own leg fly away. Still, his new knowledge screamed at him to commit to the final throw. So he wobbled low, slammed his now armless shoulder into Boffah and tried to throw him over his body to slam head-first into the ground. He got under Boffah, even managed to lift him. But without his missing hands, he couldn’t stabilize and guide Boffah. Julius attempted to compensate by taking a step and shifting momentum, but his foot wasn’t attached. Boffah’s weight fully imposed itself on the off-balance skeleton, and the rest of his muscles broke. Julius fell to bits, and the walking corpse-dummy fell on top of his bones.

The walls rumbled as the dark Vines writhed in mirth and Vinny cackled with metaphorically gut-busting laughter. “That was…certainly educational.”

“Ow.”

“Indeed, though the Julius was willing, his flesh was too weak.”

“Uhhhgh.”

The vines had begun polishing their dwarven skull. “Oh, come on, man-thing! Pull yourself together and get back to it!”

“I don’t wanna!”

“One little fist fight, and you go to pieces.” The vines sagged. “Honestly, you’re such a mage.”

Julius tried to shake is fist, remembered he had no hands and focused. His glowing muscles reformed, then reshaped into an alien configuration. His muscles now formed a misshapen arm out of some ribs and his left foot that had been lodged in his rib cage. “I defy your shtereotypesh! One day I will be a great Mushcle Wizhard! I can shee it now. Julius the Mad, shwolesht of ush all. Punching hish enemiesh to death whilsht ushing hish mighty shpellsh to create illushionary audiencshes to cheer and shwoon at hish ripped phishique.

There was a contemplative silence. Then Vinny bobbed his skull. “I’d buy tickets to that show.”

Julius beamed. “Right?”

“Indeed, now up and at it, lazybones!”

Julius groaned. “Alright, jusht give me a minute to gather myshelf. Get away Boffah!”

Boffah moaned and rose. Shambling off and out of the lab.

“Um, Vinny.”

“Yes Jules?”

“Did the zombie just mishinterpret my command and leave?”

“Yes Jules.”

“Think I should go after him?”

“Yes Jules.”

Julius glared at the ceiling as he made one bone after another roll towards his main skeleton. It was a painful and slow process. “Vinny, a hand pleashe?”

“Of course Jules.” A vine reached down, grabbed his hand and dropped it on the reforming skeleton.

“Oh thanksh. That’sh totally what I wanted. I’m shooo grateful for all that help.”

“Yes Jules.”

“You know what Vinny? I don’t think I will go after him. I mean, he’sh been working hard jusht like ush. What harm could he get to? Let him have hish fun.”

“Hmm, what harm indeed.”

Finally, Julius stood. He stretched his…arm. Julius looked down and found his right arm from the elbow down lying there. He checked his shoulder. No arm bone. Vinny spoke again. ”Indeed, what ‘arm’ seems quite correct. In fact, I think his antics are quite…humerus.”

Julius groaned. “Oh godsh. You ashshole!”

As Julius sprinted away, Vinny called out. “I say, I rather think he left you…armless! Ha ha!”

Julius called back, “Oh keep it up, you overgrown shrubbery! I’ll take a hackshaw to you if you keep hacking up theshe punsh!”

Vinny chuckled to himself. Mimed wiping a tear from the skull he always carried, and mumbled to it. “Ah Balgrim, that was amazing. I really must hit him with another after he comes back. Maybe something about that experiment costing him an arm and a leg? Hmm.” He made the skull shake itself at him. “Right, It cost him his arm twice.” He made another contemplative hum. “That adventurer was so strange. It was almost like his entire story was a joke that I knew nothing about. Odd, that.”

***

“Sho, I chashed down that blashted zombie got my bone back and shet him to shmearing poishon on every shpike trap in the dun–Hey that not-shqurril ish back!” Julius’ suddenly interrupts his own story. His easiliy derailed attention, focusing on the squirrel in his closet. “Oh wow! How did you open the door? I couldn’t shee from my angle.”

Borbigmos is suddenly worried. He’d largely ignored Julius’ babbling about squirrels on the road. But squirrels shouldn’t be able to open large locked doors.

Julius just kept talking. Broadcasting his conversation merrily to his fellow inmates. “Oh hey, you’re big now! I jusht knew you weren’t a squirel! You know, I really don’t undershtand why my companions never shee the obvioush thingsh like thish. I mean I pointed you out and everything but nooo! It’sh jusht Juliush being a bonehead again! Hey, it looksh like you’re cashting a shpell!” Julius gasps mentally. “Oh, I get it! You’re a–.”

Borbigmos knew it now. Something was very wrong. Julius just shut up mid-sentence. Julius never shuts up. “JULIUS!” He yells. Nothing. He looks at the cell, wondering if he should try to break it down. His Goliath ancestry might give him a chance, but it would be a small one.

Just then, Sasha, who had been working single-mindedly to pick the lock without tools this entire time. Suddenly pushes the door open. “Come Moe! We’re going.”

Borbigmos grins and sweeps her into a hug from behind. “Yer brilliant lassie. I can’t believe how wonderful ye-ouch!”

Sasha bites his arm. Forcing him to yelp and let go. “No grabbing. Don’t like it! Let’s go!”

“Sorry lassie.”

She growls at him. “No Lassie! Not a dog! Am Otter! Now go.”

Borbigmos has no clue where Julius is kept. He begins walking the cells, peering both directions at intersections. Finally, he comes upon something out of place. An open door. “Hey-hey! Let me out! Take me with you!” Shouts a voice from behind. A stranger sits in a cell opposite him. Looking rather worse for wear. Borbigmos snorts and ignores him as several other occupants start shouting for the same. He approaches the door and steps to peer inside. A sudden complete absence of noise assaults him. It is so disorienting to have the echoing shouts silenced that he gets vertigo and stumbles to the side.

“Woah.” he tries to say, but nothing rumbles in his ears. His chest bubbles and his voice box rumbles, but he hears nothing but endless ringing silence. Blearily, he glances back, seeing Sasha baring her teeth, preparing to fight any ambush by tooth and paw. He opens his jaws and flexes his mouth, the silence like a pressure on his eardrums. He can see the same prisoner still gripping the bars of their cell. They are pointing to the side and mouthing frantically at him. The silence is so absolute his body desperately seeks sensation to replace it, and he feels a pounding in his chest. Still absolutely silent. He knows that the lub-dub throb he swears he hears is merely a memory. Finally, his eyes rise to the far wall. Where the algae on the wall has grown into a strange shape. Almost like a map. This must be where Julius was held, but he isn’t here now. He feels a tug on his tunic and he turns. He sees Sasha pointing down the hall and looks just in time to see eight guardsmen take up a surrounding position outside the door. They are mouthing shouts, but Borbigmos hears nothing. Sasha hides behind him. He tries to raise his hands in a sign of surrender, but one of the guards panics and fires a crossbow at him.

“Vot Der’mo!” He silently swears as he tries to catch the bolt and fails. The silence is too disorienting, and the bolt slides home in his thigh. He screams soundlessly and stumbles. The other guards rush him and tackle him to the ground. Gauntlet shod hands roughly pull his hands back to be manacled, and something torques his crossbow bolted leg. The pain forces a soundless scream as he bucks involuntarily. The guards must think he is resisting because a sword pommel comes ramming down into his face, which forces his head down until it impacts the stone below him. The silence is joined by a flash of light and then, as darkness creeps in, he sees the algae stained wall again. I’ll be a capprid’s goo-star, but that really does look like a treasure map, is his last thought as the silence closes in.